Presentation used by colleague without consent

Anonymous

February 23,2024 at 2:38PM UTC

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Presentation used by colleague without consent

My workplace is a small architectural firm with lesser than 30 staff.

Last year August, we had organised an internal sharing session on lessons learned from our projects. It was a very personal sharing for me as I shared about my first project (project A) since joining the firm and I had shared about lessons that were personal and impactful to me. My manager even commented on my presentation slides and rehearsed with me prior the session.

Today we organised another sharing session and we had been requested to share about reviews on our projects.

My colleague who worked with me on project A was assigned to present about her review on it. We had worked closely in other projects as well but it had not been a good experience over the past 3 years due to unfair workload distribution. After reflecting my thoughts to my manager, they will be reassigned to other projects next month onwards.

When we were assigned the presentation yesterday they asked for my presentation slides prepared for the last presentation in August (our presentation materials are always accessible in office server for reference) and I had provided to them. Somehow knowing thier intention, I had provided my slides to see what they would do. Obviously they failed to prove me wrong and used my slides for presentation today without changing anything. They did not even bother to change the date nor asked if they could use it.

Should I be flagging this to my manager? Although i had presented last year, I don't think my manager remembers as they need to oversee many things.

Appreciate your kind advice.

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AnonymousFebruary 23,2024 at 3:10PM UTC
While this was very shady on their part, you did give it to them. Did they keep your name as the author of the presentation? It should have been evident to anyone who saw the former presentation that they had seen it before, so they buried themself. I would give your supervisor more credit, as they probably did notice, so bringing it up casually in conversation during a 1:1 session wouldn't hurt. If they changed your name to theirs on the presentation, then you should absolutely bring this up.
Katheryn MFebruary 23,2024 at 3:33PM UTC
I wouldn't report it to your manager; I'd bring it up directly with the person.
"Hey, you asked for my slides and I was happy to share them. However, I didn't appreciate you directly using my exact slides. I am happy to share my work to help you come up with your own presentation. But, I worked really hard on those slides, so in the future please do not use them as your own. Thanks"
AnonymousFebruary 23,2024 at 3:37PM UTC
Good point, and if the presentation was in PowerPoint, the original author (assuming the OP's company installs it with OP's name in the author field) and other identifying information (such as original date, number of edits, etc.) are contained in the "properties" of the file. These can be changed or gotten around by copying/pasting from one document to another. But, considering that the person did not have the wherewithal to change the date, it is doubtful they did this either.
AnonymousFebruary 23,2024 at 3:49PM UTC
They took a shortcut and used a prior presentation? I'm wondering if your manager will view the lack of permission as a problem? Do you think it's a disciplinary problem or just a lazy work that will be excused as no big deal?
Whether you highlight it will depend on your manager's view of teams sharing internal work and what constitutes disrespect within the team.
AnonymousFebruary 23,2024 at 3:51PM UTC
My daughter just had a similar issue and she's started adding her name in the corner of all of her slides and worksheets so nobody else can claim primary credit. She had always wondered why a lot of internal documentation had the name of a colleague who's been gone for years at this point. Now she understands.
AnonymousFebruary 25,2024 at 1:37PM UTC
while you prepared it, it’s your company’s work product. You don’t own it, your company does. It may be annoying and potentially unethical (although you did give it to them), but the company will likely appreciate the efficiencies gained by not forcing another employee to start from scratch. And, had you not shared, it could have blown back on you. Katheryn Ms comment was the best one about taking the person aside, although remember you may be the author but you aren’t the owner. Overall, though, this is a personality not company issue. A colleague asked for slides you did for the company that the company owns for this persons use and they didn’t give you credit. If credit is that important to you, mention it during your one on one too. “It was great that ____ was able to use my slides for the _____presentation to save time.” If you phrase it that way, you’ll look less like a kid crying over a toy taken on the playground and more like a team player who’s contributing not just on their own accounts and acting as a leader.
AnonymousFebruary 25,2024 at 2:10PM UTC
For perspective, in my office environment, the other person would have been in trouble for *not* reusing your slides. Reinventing the wheel is frowned upon - time is money - the COMPANY money.
AnonymousFebruary 26,2024 at 4:01AM UTC
Same for me - at the companies I've worked at, sharing and reusing others' slides is common for shared projects.
Lynne GuraFebruary 25,2024 at 6:58PM UTC
LOL! Your manager will notice that they had seen the slides before.
I'd talk to your boss and casually say, 'did you recognize the slides?' Then fill them in that they used your work verbatim. Then I would say, 'I thought they were using them for reference. What do you think?'
Don't lose your mind over it. It happens all the time. Just make sure your boss know that you created the originals..
AnonymousFebruary 27,2024 at 1:30PM UTC
I had something similar happen to me recently where parts of my presentation were taken to build a company initiative. This was taken off of a shared platform that we all use. My name was clearly on the material. While I suppose I should be flattered, I was actually irritated, because it’s so easy (and professional) to ask. Someone could say, “Hey, I like what you did with your slides/idea. Do you mind if I build on the concept, and I’ll give you credit?” I did mention it to my manager when I found out, so you should speak up. These things happen because others can be a bit lazy and apathetic and struggle to build their own concepts, so they “borrow” from others, and the people having their materials copied are afraid to say anything. You are well within your rights, simply as a human being, to ask for respect, fairness, and acknowledgement.
M BaazaFebruary 27,2024 at 1:51PM UTC
It's company property. Of course it's courteous if they let you know and more courteous if they ask but if they were done during company time with company resources, they don't belong to you
AnonymousFebruary 27,2024 at 2:57PM UTC
We reuse slides all the time its company work product, its how we are efficient and not recreating the wheel which is a waste of time thay could be spent on other things.
We also present with a "we" mentality, so if I was presenting your same slide, I would say things like "we", "the team" "our observations" and give credit where it makes sense to call out someone individually.
Like you said at the start it was really personal to you, taking it personal can create a lot of unnecessary challenges in the workplace, and was something I grew to learn.
Amy KeachFebruary 27,2024 at 4:19PM UTC
I see a lot of opinions here. While I agree overall that reusing slides from a format, organization, and continuity perspective is standard procedure, what I read as the coworker doing is not. As I read this, the coworker made zero changes to a deck containing 6-month-old personal reflections on the project by the OP. That is NOT standard procedure and should be addressed. I don't remember who said it, but someone mentioned saying something like "wasn't it great that so&so was able to re-use my original slides verbatim?" - that's the tack I would take. If OP is raising it to her boss, I would similarly position it (and I think someone else also said this) as "I'm happy to have been able to help so&so with her presentation by letting her use mine".
kathleen murphyFebruary 27,2024 at 6:53PM UTC
If possible, for future work, get your name somewhere in the presentation, no matter how small the font you use.
I might even say to said coworker: Glad that worked out well for you! I invested a lot of thought in developing that PPT and am happy it's receiving continued use.
Kill 'em with kindness!
AnonymousFebruary 27,2024 at 11:10PM UTC
I am very sorry that happened to you. Your vulnerability and your willingness to be honest and open about your first project was helpful to others. I learn a lot from others when they share about past experiences. Can you speak to your colleague about not using your presentation materials without speaking to you first?
LORI-ANN BURLINGAMEFebruary 28,2024 at 5:59AM UTC
Are you aware that anything you work on for the company is concerned company property? (I'm a former labor relations specialist and have worked with in-house attorneys on many company related issues.)
You may want to check your employee handbook or other company policies and procedures. Unfortunately, the company does not have to ask you to use it -- although it would have been nice if they had.
AnonymousFebruary 28,2024 at 5:13PM UTC
On a lighter note, the consulting firm I worked with had an on-line repository of work product for colleagues to refer to when handling a similar project. I was working on a project that was fairly new to the industry so there was not a lot of reference material available. I asked a colleague if they knew of any relevant reference materials, and she pointed me to a particular case in our files by case number. I had to chuckle when I found the author of the previous study was ME!
AnonymousFebruary 29,2024 at 10:01PM UTC
I would have just yelled out, "oh, MY slides! Yay!" But, people that know me know I would do that, so they wouldn't do it!